Employment Screening Getting It Done R

ight

Employment screening is easy to order online nowadays, but beware, many online s
creening companies provide cursory, unreliable background reports. This article
tells you what you need to know in order to evaluate the quality of employment
background screening you're getting from your present screening company and sugg
ests public information sources you can use to do all or some of the work inhous
e, if you choose.

Employment screening means, essentially, checking out a job candidate's backgrou

nd. Is the person who he or she claims to be, with the qualifications stated in
the resume or job application? Does the candidate have any criminal conviction
s or other disqualifying qualities or issues?
It's easy to get employment screening done nowadays a few mouse clicks will get
you an online report on just about anybody via one of the hundreds of Web-based
employment screening companies out there. But, frankly, many of the screening s
ervices being offered online are cursory and, well, unreliable at best. Are you
sure you're really getting a valid, reliable screening report? Will it stand u
p to scrutiny if a legal issue (e.g., God forbid, a lawsuit) ever happens to you
r company? To judge this, you need to know a little about employment-related ba
ckground checking, which is what this brief article is about.
First, you should be aware that pre-employment screening in the U.S. is closely
regulated by the federal Fair Credit Reporting Act and various state employment
laws. The law does of course permit employers to conduct background checks on po
tential employees, but employers are required to disclose in writing to the job
applicant that they intend to do so, and if an adverse action is taken due to info
rmation found in the background check (i.e., the person is not hired), then the
employer has to inform the applicant of this and disclose the specific unfavorab
le information uncovered.
Oftentimes, such unfavorable information consists of a criminal records finding.
A thorough pre-employment check should always include a comprehensive criminal
records search. If your job candidate has been convicted of fraud or other serio
us crimes in the past, this is obviously relevant to your employment decision (a
lthough the law requires you to consider each case of a criminal record finding
on an individual basis in terms of its seriousness and job relevancy.)
It's also important to be aware that many third-party pre-employment screening ser
vices (especially Web-based companies) do a less-than-adequate job of searching
criminal records. They simply don't cast a wide enough net in their searches. M
ost conduct criminal records searches only in the state-of-residence or even jus
t the county-of-residence of the job applicant. So your applicant may have a fra
ud conviction, or even a lengthy rap sheet, in another state, but come up clean
on the pre-employment check.
Many people with criminal records are quite aware of this shortcoming, and simpl
y move out-of-state when jobhunting.
That's why your screening company should run a national database criminal record
s search as part of the screening process. Unfortunately, the best national crim
inal records databases currently available to the public are incomplete. They om
it data from numerous counties across the country and sometimes contain out-of-d
ate data. So it's important to supplement the national database criminal records
search with onsite searches at county courthouses in your job applicant's count
ies-of-residence. All reputable pre-employment screening agencies have this capa
bility.
Accepting your screening agency's standard pre-employment screening report, if it
checks for criminal records only in your applicant's state-of-residence, is clea
rly inadequate. Your otherwise-impressive applicant may have a history of seriou
s fraud convictions or other crimes in another state.
But even the criminal records searches described above are not enough. To be rea
lly thorough, your screening agency must also check:
-- Aliases. Has your job candidate been convicted of a crime under another name
?
-- Warrants. Is your candidate wanted somewhere in the U.S.? Although you can't
legally deny an applicant a job for this reason, you can suggest that he/she rea
pply once the criminal warrant is cleared up. The same is true if the applicant
is out on bail pending prosecution. You can ask the candidate to reapply after a
ppearing in court and clearing the matter. (Note that you can't legally inquire
whether your candidate is in a drug rehabilitation program, however, as this may
fall under the Americans With Disabilities Act, and compromise your position sh
ould litigation ever occur.)
-- Federal convictions, such an income tax evasion, mail fraud, drug trafficking
, and immigration law offenses.
-- International wanted lists, such as Interpol's.
-- And yes, even terrorist watch lists. Why not? -- it's easy to do.
Unfortunately, very few pre-employment screening companies are this thorough. To
most, pre-employment screening is a volume business and each applicant you submit
gets a quick and cursory (not to say quick and dirty ) once-over. However, if you
specifically request the above additional searches, most will comply.
After An Employment Offer Has Been Made
Past workers' comp claims are the most obvious type of public record to research
at this stage. You can't legally check to determine if your job applicant has a
history of making workers' compensation claims prior to making an offer of empl
oyment. Workers' compensation history searches must always be conducted post-off
er. However, this type of information can obviously be a valuable tool in your f
raud-fighting arsenal. Not only can it identify habitual claim filers, it can al
so help your company avoid placing new employees in positions that may pose risk
of re-injury.
Note, however, that employers may not rescind an offer due to finding claims and
must make a reasonable effort to accommodate a previously-injured worker. Even
so, a workers' comp history search can be useful at the time a new employee is b
rought aboard in verifying his/her employment record supplied on the job applica
tion. If an applicant has failed to list a previous employer against which he/sh
e filed a claim, this says something about the employee's integrity and likeliho
od to file future claims.
Currently, workers compensation history data is available in Alaska, Arizona, Ar
kansas, California, Florida, Idaho, Illinois, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisiana, Marylan
d, Massachusetts, Michigan, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Ohio
, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Vermont, and
Wyoming. California requires prior written approval by the California Department
of Industrial Relations, Division of Workers Compensation Electronic Data Excha
nge (EDEX). Your pre-employment screening agency should be able to provide the n
eeded forms.
Workers compensation searches are not available in: Alabama, Colorado, Connectic
ut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Georgia, Hawaii, Indiana, Kansas, Maine, Min
nesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North C
arolina, Oregon, Rhode Island, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia,
and Wisconsin.
So criminal records (if thoroughly researched) and workers' compensation histori
es can be extremely helpful -- what other types of public information might be u
seful in the investigation of a suspicious claim? There are innumerable categori
es of records and searches that could be mentioned. Here are a few to consider:
-- Civil Suits. You can research civil suits online through most counties' websi
tes. A good listing of county websites and phone numbers is available on Backgro
und Check Gateway.
-- Facebook, MySpace, and other social networking sites. Did your candidate post
pictures of himself/herself surfboarding off Malibu while collecting disability
? Interesting.
-- Newsgroups. Did you know that at Google Groups you can search someone's posti
ngs to newsgroups (of which there are thousands and thousands nowadays) going ba
ck years? Yet many people have no idea their postings are public information whi
ch can easily be tracked by their name or email address. What's your candidate t
alking about these days in the NASCAR Enthusiast newsgroup?
-- Blogs. Same principle. If your candidate, like millions of us, keeps a chatty
public diary online (i.e., blog), you can listen in via IceRocket.com.
-- Career sites. Is your candidate applying for other jobs by posting a resume o
n Monster.com or other career sites? It might be revealing to find out what qual
ifications he/she is claiming in those applications.
-- Real Estate. Has your candidate recently taken out a mortgage on a new house
or condo? This can be an indicator of financial stability, an important qualifi
cation for many types of positions. You can research this at SearchSystems.net,
among many other sites.
Accessing public records used to be an incredibly difficult chore. Your main too
l in the old days was shoe leather as you plodded from courthouse to courthouse di
gging out dusty records. Now, with the Internet, it's easy. You can access publi
c records on your job applicant or employee which are scattered nationwide in mi
nutes. Give it a try and you'll soon wonder why you never made full use of publi
c records as an employment-screening tool before!

Joseph Ryan is director of Washington Research Associates, Inc., which provides

employment screening services for small business clients at http://www.E-Employm
entScreening.net.